How to Use Images Without Copyright Restrictions
Images are everywhere. Books, magazines, television, signs and advertisements—we’re surrounded by images of every type everywhere we look, and nowhere is that more true than online. Every website is first and foremost a visual medium, and that means lots eye-catching images. Unfortunately, we can’t just borrow images that we like to use in our own projects; those images belong to someone. There are ways, however, to find images and illustrations that can be used without violating anyone’s rights or copyright restrictions.
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Instructions
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Find image sources online. Sources of restriction-free and free-use images abound online. Unrestricted image hosts like Morguefile, Allourstock and Stock.XCHNG feature large, fully categorized libraries of images that are free for public use. Browse the categories or search by keywords to find the best images for your project.
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Download the images to your computer. Many sites will provide direct download links for their images, allowing you to download them by simply clicking your mouse on the link. Others allow image downloading by right-clicking on the image and selecting “Save Image as. . .”
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Adjust the image to fit your project. Free-use or “pubic domain” images may be altered or adjusted to suit your specific needs, such as adding text to an image, cropping out parts of the image or resizing images to fit a given space. Microsoft Windows provides a free program called “Paint” that can be used to alter images; other programs to adjust images on your computer can be found online, or are free to use through your web browser.
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Place the image into a project or website. You may acknowledge the source of the image by providing the provider’s name or the website’s URL with it—usually in small print directly under the image. Acknowledgment of the image’s source is a means of thanking content providers, as well as encouraging others to share images for free public use. Some image providers make including source acknowledgment a condition of using their images.
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Tips & Warnings
Take note of any partial restrictions which image owners may have placed on the images they provide. For example, some artists and photographers release their images for free use only for non-commercial purposes such as personal blogs or web pages. Always respect the restrictions placed on an image’s use by the copyright holder.
Some images not provided for the general public might be permitted for your use if you simply contact the copyright holder and explain what you’d like to use her image for. How widely the image will be seen and whether it’s used for commercial purposes are usually factors copyright holders consider when granting permission to use their images.
Never use an image if you’re in doubt as to whether or not the image is unrestricted for your use. Using others’ work, including drawings, illustrations, photographs, fonts, etc. is a violation of the owner’s copyright, and copyright abuses can be punished with fines and other legal actions.
Be aware that while images may have no copyright restrictions or usage restrictions, they are still owned by the original creator unless the creator has explicitly released their images into the “public domain.”
References
Resources
- Photo Credit Jupiterimages/Brand X Pictures/Getty Images
